People celebrate the capture in Tripoli of Moammar Gadhafi's son and one-time heir apparent, Seif al-Islam, at the rebel-held town of Benghazi, Libya, early Monday, Aug. 22, 2011. Libyan rebels raced into Tripoli in a lightning advance Sunday that met little resistance as Moammar Gadhafi's defenders melted away and his 40-year rule appeared to rapidly crumble. The euphoric fighters celebrated with residents of the capital in the city's main square, the symbolic heart of the regime. (AP Photo/Alexandre Meneghini)

Paul of Dune was so bad it gave me a seizure that dislocated both of my shoulders and prolapsed my anus.~Pink Snowman

It's late night in Tripoli and The Big Gaddafi is sipping a White Russian, smoking some prime Maghreb produce and tuning in to a bank of plasma TVs in his tent at the Bab al-Aziziyah fortress. No luscious Ukrainian nurse could possibly appease his restless soul.

He stares in disbelief at the narrative unrolling in the digital Western alphabet soup known as "news"; they swear Muammar Gaddafi is "besieged", "exhausted", "looking for a way out", "preparing to flee" (to Tunisia) and it's "only a matter of time" before his regime "collapses".

All this because a bunch of barbarian Bedouins backed by North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) bombs had decided to pee on his carpet.

The Big Gaddafi: That rug really tied the room together.

He can hardly picture himself as "besieged". After all his box-office appeal in Libya at least doubled in the past few months. And then some White House dude told his guys they would abide by a ceasefire where NATO would rule only some patches of Cyrenaica - yes for Benghazi, no for Misrata - and would make way for a blue helmet UN peacekeeping force.

He looks at his iPhone calendar; the holy Muslim fasting month of Ramadan will go on until August 29. There are still roughly 10 days for the ceasefire to go into effect. But the Americans - as usual - were greedy. They wanted all the oil and gas concessions they could lay their hands on, and they wanted him to retire. The oil and gas, that's negotiable - for a price. As for the retirement, stuff it.

Big Gaddafi sidekick: When we make the handoff, I double back, grab one of 'em and beat it out of him! Huh?

The Big Gaddafi: That's a great plan. That's fuckin' ingenious, if I understand it correctly. It's a Swiss fuckin' watch.

What kind of "popular" war was that? His intel guys had brought him on a silver plate the latest Rasmussen poll - according to which only 20% of Americans supported the US/NATO bombing scam, especially because those goons were bombing scores of civilians, even kids. The Europeans - real people, not Brussels bureaucrats - were even more disgusted.

And to believe that these European nihilists tried to sell the fiction that he, Gaddafi, was an "evil dictator" who wanted to "kill his own people"!

Big Gaddafi sidekick: Nihilists! Fuck me. I mean, say what you like about the tenets of National Socialism, Arab Dude, at least it's an ethos.

The European nihilists were bombing civilian infrastructure - depriving a lot of people in Western Libya of food and water, so they would "rise" to topple him. That's how a war to "protect civilians" works out in those sick Western minds: you terrorize the shit out of civilians.

The Big Gaddafi knew he was not alone. People in Tripoli were not "fearful". Students, teachers, average citizens, all fully armed with kalashnikovs, RPGs and mortars, were ready to dig in, to take over the edges of town, to man a cordon of check points, to organize house-to-house defense. The "NATO rebels" would never prevail.

Indeed. He now knew for sure that the largest tribes - Warfa'llah, Washafana, Tarhouna, Zlitan - were all behind him. And that, contrary to "NATO rebel" propaganda, Zawiya, Gharian and Surman had not fallen.

He knew those unsavory Transitional National Council (TNC) characters would always be embroiled in their own tribal wars, in fact mini civil wars.

He couldn't believe how dumb those Americans and Europeans were, showering money on the Abu Ubaidah bin Jarrah brigade - who refuses to fight under the "rebel NATO" arm and instead maintains "internal security" - by beheading their enemies.

He was now even profiting from support by the furious Obeidi tribe - which includes the family of General Abdul Fatah Younis, his former Interior Minister turned defector and "rebel" commander-in-chief, killed by the "NATO rebels" themselves.

Those dumb Westerners that until yesterday were kissing the hem of his lavish tunics in his itinerant tents were now salivating over juicy commercial deals and the even juicier carve-up of the oilfields, believing they would later be able to contain the inevitable, monster tribal, civil war.

The Big Gaddafi: So if you could just write me my check for 10% of a half trillion … 50 billion …I'll go out and mingle.

He had always known why they came to pee on his carpet. Because he didn't hand the Brits, the Frogs and the Yanks the oil concessions they wanted. So them, and those unspeakable Saudi bastards started propping up these fanatic al-Qaeda-related types - just like they did in Afghanistan in the 1980s.

Western "banksters" invented an "alternative" Central Bank - with HSBC's help - to rob Libya's money. They also invented a new, to be fully privatized, national oil company, managed by Qatar, to rob Libya's oil. Why haven't he thought about this scam before - "humanitarian war"? He could have made a killing.

The Big Gaddafi: You have your story, I have mine. I say that I entrusted the money to you, and *you* stole it!

The "coalition": As if we would ever *dream* of taking your bullshit money!

Blowback will come - and it will be a bitch.

NATO's bombs had downgraded the Libyan oil industry at least three years. But those cowards wouldn't have the guts to engage in a Battle of Tripoli - killing women and children en masse.

The Big Gaddafi: Ow! Fucking fascists!

They would have to bomb Tripoli to the stone age - just like they did to Baghdad. Or drop some crazy biological plague to void the whole city.

The Big Gaddafi: I do mind, the Dude minds. This will not stand, ya know, this aggression will not stand, man.

Well, if this is the kind of paradise NATO plus those "democrat" Saudis and Qataris wanted, the Arab Dude would abide - and make their lives hell. A free market free-for-all, an Africom base in the Mediterranean, a flimsy puppet government, a Libyan Karzai - and a vicious guerrilla force fighting them till Kingdom Come. Afghanistan remixed.

The Big Gaddafi rolled The Chocolate Watchband on his iPod - I just dropped in/ to see/ what condition my condition was in - checked the perimeter and stepped out into the not so cool Northern African night. Not for long. NATO jets circled the sky above - and seven loud blasts hit Bab al-Aziziyah.

The Stranger: Darkness washed over the Dude - darker'n a black steer's tookus on a moonless prairie night. There was no bottom.

Pepe Escobar is the author of Globalistan: How the Globalized World is Dissolving into Liquid War (Nimble Books, 2007) and Red Zone Blues: a snapshot of Baghdad during the surge. His new book, just out, is Obama does Globalistan (Nimble Books, 2009).

no, no ... watch the whole thing, and all the other stuff floating around about the "Gold Dinar" ....

it wasn't about oil "per se", it was about Gadaffi & the Libyan State Bank's lead role in creating this "African Gold Standard" currency ...

and yes, also tied-in to the CIA boys thinking they finally had an opportunity to oust (yet another) military dictator they had put intopower during the Cold War, and gradually pissed-off and lost control of ...

[edit] I also really enjoy the "Russia Today" stuff ... like Al-Jazeera, it's very worthwhile to take a look at other global propagandafrom time to time, instead of just American Imperialist Press & Western Eurofag Whining ...

................ I exist only to amuse myself ................

I personally feel that this message board, Jacurutu, is full of hateful folks who don't know how to fully interact with people. ~ "Spice Grandson" (Bryon Merrit) 08 June 2008

Watched both to length, I can see the gold dinar pissing the elite off, and so on. Oil as issue far behind all that. All perspectives are cool with me, take them with grain of salt. CIA was in there some where with the UN people. Now that he is in Algeria, out in the wild so to speak, don't see him lasting long, surprised his female guard didnt turn and kill him on the spot.

Good bye Crazy evil bastage Kadaffy duck, you got what you deserved. SR I don't pay as close attention anymore myself becuase the shit is all negative. I can create enough negative energy standing still letting my own mine wander, without having to follow all the things going on.

The upside is good for the people over there, I wish them peace and freedom and all the best. Hopefully they don't trade one mess for another.

lots of hotspots over there, I hope we continue on track and remove ourselves from them and get our folks back home. We have enough to worry about here in America, and time to fix home first.

The announcement that Islamic sharia law will be the basis of legislation in newly liberated Libya has raised concerns, especially among women, despite Islamists insisting moderation will prevail.

Interim leader Mustafa Abdel Jalil said on Sunday, during his speech to the nation in Benghazi to formally declare the country's liberation from the ousted regime of Moammer Kadhafi, that sharia would be Libya's principal law.

"Any law that violates sharia is null and void legally," he said, citing as an example the law on marriage passed during the slain dictator's 42-year tenure that imposed restrictions on polygamy, which is permitted in Islam.

"The law of divorce and marriage... This law is contrary to sharia and it is stopped," Abdel Jalil said.

His comments have provoked criticism and calls for restraint both in Libya and in Europe, amid fears that the Arab Spring may give rise to a potentially intolerant Islamist resurgence.

Many Libyans awaiting Sunday's historic speech expressed surprise at the decision by the National Transitional Council leader to mention the role of sharia law in the new country before addressing such important issues as security and education.

"It's shocking and insulting to state, after thousands of Libyans have paid for freedom with their lives, that the priority of the new leadership is to allow men to marry in secret," said Rim, 40, a Libyan feminist who requested anonymity.

"We did not slay Goliath so that we now live under the Inquisition," she told AFP.

In his speech, Abdel Jalil also announced the introduction of Islamic banking in Libya in keeping with sharia which prohibits the earning of interest, or riba in Arabic, that is considered a form of usury.

Adelrahman al-Shatr, one of the founders of the centre-right Party of National Solidarity, launched just last week, said it was premature for the NTC leader to speak about the policies of the new state.

"It is a subject that should be discussed with the different political groups and with the Libyan people," he said.

"These declarations create feelings of pain and bitterness among women who sacrificed so many martyrs," in the eight-month battle against Kadhafi loyalists, he added.

"By abolishing the marriage law, women lose the right to keep the family home if they divorce. It is a disaster for Libyan women."

Abdel Jalil, a respected former justice minister of Kadhafi who distanced himself from the old regime, is seen as a pious man and a Sufi follower of Islam who is at odds with extremism.

He has already said that the new Libya would not adopt any extremist ideology, and sought to reassure the international community by stating on Monday that Libyans were moderate Muslims.

Nevertheless, Libya's Islamists are a rising force in the country's political arena, some of whom, such as Abdelhakim Belhaj, the founder of the Al-Qaeda linked but now-disbanded Libyan Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG), are expected to hold prominent positions.

After suffering decades of persecution by Kadhafi, they are also working hard to present themselves as proponents of tolerant, democratic values and policies.

"The rules and laws (in new Libya) should take Islam as a basic reference," Islamist leader Sheikh Ali Sallabi, a supporter of Belhaj, told AFP.

He insisted that freedom, justice, equality and respect for human dignity should be enshrined in the new constitution, along with the peaceful rotation of power.

"We believe in the rights of others to show their programmes to the people, and to let the people decide," said Sallabi, who was jailed for eight years during the 1980s in Tripoli's notorious Abu Salim prison.

"We also believe in the freedom of the press and the right to self expression. We believe that our religion accommodates these rights," he added.

Paul of Dune was so bad it gave me a seizure that dislocated both of my shoulders and prolapsed my anus.~Pink Snowman

I just don't see Islam and Democracy as bedfellows, bad move to announce oppressive Sharia Law this early. Separation of church (or religion) and state should be a rule in granite,although not part of our Constitution in any form, it surely is implied, and they should follow that example.

You fight to take the hammer from the tyrant, then pick it up and hit yourself in the head.